F1 News: 2015 Chinese GP Qualifying – Sauber F1 Team

Strong performance by the Sauber F1 Team in qualifying for the Chinese Grand Prix on the Shanghai International Circuit. Both Felipe Nasr and Marcus Ericsson put in strong drives in the Sauber C34-Ferrari and managed to make it into Q3. Felipe Nasr came ninth, and Marcus Ericsson tenth. They now have a promising platform from which to fight for points in the race.

Marcus Ericsson (car number 9):
Sauber C34-Ferrari (Chassis 02/Ferrari)
Qualifying: 10th in Q3 (1:38.158 min / soft tyres)
3rd practice: 13th (1:39.559 min / soft tyres / 18 laps)
“It is a great achievement for the whole team to get both cars into Q3 – for the race team as well as everyone back at the factory in Hinwil. This weekend has been extremely tight as the lap times are quite close. Felipe and I put in good performances today and placed the cars in a promising position for tomorrow. It will be an exciting race, and I think, we have good chances for another positive day.”

Felipe Nasr (car number 12):
Sauber C34-Ferrari (Chassis 01/Ferrari)
Qualifying: 9th in Q3 (1:38.067 min / soft tyres)
3rd practice: 14th (1:39.591 min / soft tyres / 19 laps)
“It is a great day for the team being able to have both cars in Q3. We seem to have the cars back on the pace we expected to have here. Therefore, I am confident for the race tomorrow. Hopefully we can get back into the points, and I will do my best to finish the race in the top ten.”

Monisha Kaltenborn, Team Principal:
“This is a strong qualifying result, which came as a little bit of a surprise considering the lap times in FP3. Looking at our strong long-runs yesterday, it was important to also be fast in qualifying on a sinlge lap, in order to have good grid positions. We managed to achieve this, which is great. Both drivers used the full potential of the car and were rewarded by making it into Q3. Now we will concentrate fully on the race.“

Giampaolo Dall’Ara, Head of Track Engineering:
“In the morning we concentrated on refining the set-up of our cars, and building on what we learned yesterday. It was particularly about maximising the peak performance of the tyres, which yesterday was a bit of a problem for one of the cars. By qualifying we had managed to put everything together, so everybody did a good job with the two drivers extracting the full performance from the cars. We can build on a strong qualifying position with both cars in the top ten. Now we will work hard in order to convert that into a positive result in the race.“